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Today we are going to reveal the TRUTH about printing.   We are going to expose the fact that printing is really just an optical illusion.  What we think are continuous tones and gradients are really just a bunch of tiny dots smoothed by the human eye into the beautiful full color images that we see in print. We explain how the relationship between pixels per inch (PPI), dots per inch (DPI) and lines per inch (LPI) is vital to creating the highest quality images. And we show you in detail how to create high quality images that will literally POP off the printed page.

We’re going to dive into this magical and mysterious process and explain how pixels and dots come together through the halftone process to make the magic of printing happen.  And once this is revealed we are going to explain how you can use this knowledge to create photos and images that truly pop off the printed page.

The halftone screening process was invented over 100 years ago.  Although we have made incredible technological advances over that time we still use this basic principle in printing because our eyes and brains haven’t changed. We are still fooled into thinking tiny dots grouped together in a certain pattern form continuous tones.

Here’s a grayscale image that goes from black to white.  It was created with a laser printer that only has one color black. Millions of black dots laid down individually trick our mind into thinking we are seeing hundreds of shades of grey.

The printing process is binary.  Ink or no ink.  The ink cartridge is doing one thing: printing a black dot.

As you can see in the enlarged image to create the shading, small dots placed next to each other in a certain pattern tricked the eye into thinking it is seeing many shades of grey.  That’s the basics of halftone

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It’s really incredible how the beauty of the printed page is really just 4 colors and millions of dots placed next to each other.

People send jobs to printers all the time but may not have an idea of what happens during the printing process.  In this post my goal is to help make you a better publisher or designer by peeling back the curtain and sharing the fundamentals of the print process.  I will share what happens behind the scenes after the printer gets your files.

I’m going to explain how we turn your digital creation into a physical printed product. This includes why we use CMYK vs. RGB, the importance of color dots and angles and how they all work together to create the beauty of the printed page.

As a designer and publisher you already have a good understanding about the Art (digital files) now when you combine that with the Science (transforming digital into physical dots, adding ink, and finally a sheet of paper.) It will help you attach meaning to the designs and publications you create.  You will know why you are doing what you’re doing, because you understand, the The Art and Science of Print. Or as we like to say here at Shweiki Media the Magic of Printing.

We’ll start with the four colors CMYK.  CMY does stand for Cyan, Magenta & Yellow, but while many in the design & print professions are often taught that the K stands for the K in Black (and that B was not used because B stands for Blue), this explanation is incorrect. The K in CMYK actually stands for “Key,” as in “Key Color” or “Key Plate,” and yes, black ink is typically used as the Key.

The Key Plate is the plate that holds the most detail in the image which is the Black plate. The remaining plates (Cyan, Magenta & Yellow) are carefully keyed, or aligned, with the Black Plate.

The process of aligning the color separated plates to the Key Plate is known as Registration. It is the printers responsibility to make sure the color dots are in register during the printing process. This is done using registration marks on the plates.  On our press we have cameras on each unit that are constantly reading the registration marks and automatically make adjustments to the register as needed

If the dots are not in register the resulting image will appear out of focus or blurry.  When this happens, we’ll often say that the image is “out of register.”

So now let’s talk about the difference between CMYK and RGB.  CMYK is used for print and RGB is used for digital.  But why you may ask.

On a monitor,  your color is created with RGB colored lights. However, on printed materials, if you converted those red, green and blue lights to inks and laid them on top of or close to each other on paper they would produce even darker colors.  This makes it difficult to produce lighter colors such as yellow.

Using a CMY provides a solution to this problem. Cyan, magenta, and yellow are lighter than red, green, and blue. CMY will be able to cover most lighter color ranges quite easily, compared to using RGB.

That being said.  It would be a good idea to color correct your images in RGB mode because you have a broader color gamut on your monitor. Then convert to CMYK and make any final tweaks. The printer can convert the files automatically but this may result in unexpected shifts in color to the photos.

Remember RGB is digital and CMYK is for print.

Now let’s talk about dots and angles. Before going to press the file you sent to the printer is converted to dots for each of the CMYK colors. These dots are then imaged onto a metal plate with a laser beam on a device called a platesetter.

The printing process operates on the fundamental principle that oil and water do not mix.

The